Israeli air strikes in Gaza on Tuesday resulted in the deaths of at least 50 Palestinians, according to local health authorities. The strikes occurred despite increasing international pressure on Israel to halt military operations and allow unimpeded aid into Gaza.
The attacks targeted two homes, resulting in 18 deaths, including women and children, and a school housing displaced families, among other areas, according to Gaza medics.
The Israeli military, which had warned residents of Khan Younis in southern Gaza on Monday to evacuate to the coast in preparation for an “unprecedented attack,” had no immediate comment.
Read more: Ukraine Faces Gas Shortage as Storage Facilities Dwindle
The strikes on Tuesday hit Khan Younis and areas to the north, including Deir al-Balah, Nuseirat, Jabalia, and Gaza City, medics reported.
According to Gaza medics, Israeli strikes have killed more than 500 people in the past eight days as the military campaign has intensified.
Israel’s military stated on Monday that it allowed five aid trucks into Gaza after a blockade of food and other supplies that lasted over two months.
The U.N. has stated that Gaza, with a population of approximately 2.3 million, requires at least 500 trucks of aid and commercial goods daily. Throughout the war, aid trucks have been waiting at Gaza’s border for weeks and months to enter.
The war, now in its 20th month, has strained Israel’s relations with much of the international community and those with its closest ally, the United States, now appear to be wavering.
The leaders of Britain, France, and Canada warned on Monday that they could take “concrete actions” against Israel if it did not stop military operations in Gaza and lift its restrictions on aid.
In a joint statement with the European Union and 20 other nations, the three countries cautioned that Gaza’s population was facing starvation and that the U.N. and aid groups must be allowed to carry out their work independently.
Responding to the leaders’ criticism, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his country was engaged in a “war of civilization over barbarism” and vowed it would “continue to defend itself by just means until total victory.”
Under a heavily-criticized U.S. and Israeli-backed plan to deliver aid, a newly created Gaza Humanitarian Foundation aims to start work in Gaza by the end of May.
Israel’s ground and air war has devastated Gaza, displacing nearly all its residents and killing more than 53,000 people, many of them civilians, according to Gaza health authorities.
The war erupted after Hamas-led militants attacked Israeli communities near Gaza’s border on October 7, 2023, killing about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and seizing 251 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
Israel’s leadership has insisted that it can free the hostages and dismantle Hamas through force. Netanyahu has said Israel aims to control the whole of Gaza.
Hamas has offered to release the hostages in exchange for an end to the war and the release of Palestinians in Israeli jails. A new round of indirect ceasefire talks in Qatar between Israel and Hamas has produced no breakthrough.
